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“We should undertake to live as Africans. It is the only way to live free and to live in dignity.”

Source: Speech on debt at the OAU summit, Addis Ababa, 29 July 1987

Context At the OAU summit, Sankara urged African states to refuse jointly to repay their debt and to consume what Africa produces, pointing to his own locally made clothes.

Portrait of Thomas Sankara
Thomas SankaraBurkina Faso · 1949–1987
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